Story Time
by Min Daae
Summary: A man has a brush with the Endless. Written a bit oddly, but I like it.


When I was little more than a boy – I know, dear, it was a long time ago – I saw Death, once.

At least I think that's who he was. Tall man, slenderer than a dream, hair as black as night and skin as white as snow. I was helping my papa at the time when he walked into town, cloaked in black, eyes lost under his mane of unruly black hair. I say walked, but he didn't walk, he strode, like the world was nothing beneath his feet. No one looked at him, or not really – they knew he was there, but they liked to pretend they didn't. I couldn't stop staring, though. He was the most fascinating thing I'd seen. And have seen, to this day, save maybe your grandmamma with ribbons in her hair. Ah, she was a beauty. I wonder if Death himself didn't take a fancy to her, to take her so young.

Yes, yes, I know, the story! You young people. No patience, none.

I couldn't stop looking at him, He didn't look at me, though, just strode to the fountain in the square and stopped. And sat.

I could have watched him all day, even if he wasn't doing anything. He knew I was watching him, I'm sure, but he didn't show it. I was working up my courage to go talk to him when my mama – your great-grandmama, you would have liked her, m'girl, a lot like you. Though she'd never wear one of those little skirts that make you look like a – all right, all right. I didn't stay, or speak to him, not then, anyway. My mother called me inside for dinner, and then I slept.

I didn't dream much those days; that night I did. Or it might have been a dream, I'm still not sure. It started with me at my window, looking out at the square, the fat moon spilling white milk-light on two people, the man, and a woman, as pale as frozen tears. I could hear their voices clearly through the glass.

"…sister, the boy."

"Sentimentality, Morpheus?" She sounded amused. It confused me, since the man's voice seemed to me to have no emotion. He said nothing, but he must have given her a look. "All right, all right. Don't look at me like that. But you'll need to arrange it."

"I know. I will."

And then that faded and I was just lying on the grass staring at blue sky, dragonflies big as my fist swooping around my head – I'm getting there! Such impatience. I just watched them for a while, but a man was walking toward me, and in minutes he stood over me, looking down. Stars shone in his black eyes.

"James," he said, and it wasn't strange that he knew my name. "Stand and walk with me."

I stood. He was very tall, more than twice my height and I was no stripling. His face was fine-boned, delicate, even beautiful. I knew that he was not human – how? I knew in the way of dreams! At this rate we will never finish the story. Are you ready now? Very well, where was I…ah yes. I knew he was not human, but I was not frightened. He would not hurt me, of that I was certain. We walked and the landscape changed so I scrambled over rocks. My guide seemed untroubled by the terrain. We were both silent.

"Excuse me, sir, but what is your name?" I asked, tentatively.

"You may call me Morpheus."

"Why were you in my town?" For a knew – yes, _knew, _my dear – that it was he.

"I was meeting someone."

"Who? The woman? Who is she?"

"Yes. She is my sister." His voice was heavy, almost sad. I noticed, absently, that he cast no shadow. At the time it was only part of the – what's that? Dreams are never _only, _my girl. Some say the Dream King shows us things we haven't the courage to see waking. Was he Death? Now, child, that would be skipping about. Not the proper way to tell a story.

Now then.

"Yes," he said, "She is my sister" – and we kept walking in silence, until we reached the gates of a great city all in that desert of rocks. The man stopped, his long white hand on the great handle carved like a dragon. "James," he said, and his voice was stern as the mountains. "Are you frightened?" And I said no, and the nodded and the door swung open…

What do you mean, that's not the end? That is the end. I can't remember more. I could tell you how I woke in a house I didn't know, the old couple more confused than I was at how I had escaped the desert unscathed, how I had not been put to the sword when the Northerners came on our town in force and burned it to the ground. No one had seen the tall man dressed in black but me. And I knew that I had walked with Death, and he had let me live, as he has let me live these many years, to see my granddaughter grown.

Who was the woman? I don't know, my dear, I don't know everything. Even one so old as I is yet ignorant of much. But watch for him, m'girl, the tall, pale man robed in black. I know he will take me back across the rocks someday, to a city with a gate where the handle, so they say, is carved of dragonbone.

A dream? Yes, my dear, it was. A true dream. Someday you will learn that dreams are far more real than you or I will ever be…after all, we are all the dreams of the One, and the day he wakes we may simply…vanish.

Yes, my dear, I know. Watch for him with hair as black as night, watch for him with skin as white as snow, and do not be afraid.


End file.
